Consumer Edition?

In all the years and billions of dollars revenue taken, Microsoft have only written one operating system without extensive outside assistance. PC-DOS and MS-DOS were developed from an original version written by Seattle Computer Products, Xenix was derived from Unix S7, and Windows NT was co-developed with IBM (and strongly influenced by VMS). The only purely Microsoft operating system up to now is Windows CE; and that has borrowed code from Windows NT, and includes some third party drivers.

So it seems strange that Microsoft's only purebred operating system is relegated to the dim obscurity of Handheld PCs (which is Microsoft's term for the current breed of Windows CE based PDAs). True, they have introduced some new labels for PDAs as well as HPC: AutoPC and PalmPC. The latter has hit some legal trouble, as it seems that the courts have accepted that the Palm Division of 3com has a better claim to that name.

The whole issue of trademarks under American law can become rather bemusing. In our minds we all know that KFC really stands for Kentucky Fried Chicken, just as CE stands for Consumer Edition; but if the trademark owners were to admit that, they wouldn't be able to defend these trademarks. Quite reasonably, a company isn't allowed to trademark a common word, but are allowed to take out trademarks on made up words and logos using funny capitalisation (like NeXT) or special fonts. So even though Bill Gates once accidentally told an audience that CE stands for Consumer Edition, the legal point was made immediately that CE doesn't really stand for anything. All clear now?

The signs are there for all to read that Microsoft intends a far more grandiose future for its new baby. As for the evidence, there are several pointers. The CE web site includes a list of supported processors for CE; most devices are built using either the SH3 or MIPS unit, but the list includes several others, most notably Intel 486 and Pentium. That might be taken as indicating that Intel have their own fancy plans for building low power processors, which they probably do, but it seems more reasonable to guess that it is Microsoft's own desire for an Intel version of CE. Some of the most interesting extensions for CE 2.0 are the networking components. Admittedly, as with most early versions of any Microsoft products (I've still got a copy of Windows 1.0) networking support is a crock, effectively requiring that a PC is also on the same network running CE Services. But one of the latest releases from Microsoft is a beta version of a proper networking client, including file sharing support.

I've seen networking support on PDAs before: Apple's Newton had support for one model of Farallon PC Card using TCP/IP, but they introduced it because they were moving towards desktop computing with their eMate, and so had a compelling reason to build in network support. There is even an NFS file sharing client for Psion Series 3 over serial cables, which I used to use with my Series 3a in 1993.

Using Windows CE on an HPC in an office as a web browser or email client is not my idea of having a wild party, so there must be a better reason for this networking support than browsing web sites faster. Or rather, browsing web sites very slightly faster, because the speed gain from using a 10 Mbps network card isn't the 347 times speed improvement that might be possible when compared with a 28.8 Kbps modem, or even a more likely four or five times faster; it is much slower than that.

Microsoft have also issued another product with CE support that will have rather more impact. Hydra is a code name for the beta version of a product that offers terminal services for Windows NT. This isn't entirely new; it is related to the ICA technology from Citrix that has been sold for a couple of years as WinDD from Tektronix and NTrigue from Insignia. This allows users who want to build a network composed of a few large servers running NT, and run applications on the servers from any client that can understand the Hydra protocol. In the case of NTrigue, this can be any X Window server, but clients for Windows 95 are available with Hydra. What makes this all rather more interesting is that Hydra comes with a client for CE.

CE already has a lot of attractive features that are necessary for portable computing: it has low power requirements, can run from ROM, has low (relatively) memory requirements, and has pseudo real time operation so that it can be used in embedded systems. If you put together the networking support and ability to run applications remotely on a server, the picture that emerges is of a network computer. All the basic applications are built into ROM already, like Pocket Word, Pocket Excel and Pocket Internet Explorer, so one of the main criticisms of Java based network computers is being lightly evaded.

It doesn't make sense to keep this as a pocket toy only; PDAs don't need Ethernet networking capabilities, as a rule. We all know that Windows 98 is going to be the last release in its line, apparently leaving just Windows NT to rule the desktop. But with CE capable of running on Intel systems, and with it now capable of interoperating closely with an NT server, it makes much more sense for Windows CE to take the low end of consumer computing. I could easily see a home setup consisting of a Microsoft NT Home Server living in the loft or airing cupboard, running MS Proxy and other services, and a small home network of CE devices; some of them Intel PCs just like today, only running Windows CE with all the main applications shared from the server. CE will become the consumer operating system for all white goods computers: those in the home used for control tasks and simple information management tasks, and basic workstations for office desktop use, with NT for more powerful workstations and servers.

One of the wierder ideas that Apple came up with when trying to dream up uses for the Newton was of intelligent refrigerator magnets. This is one of the more off the wall ways of looking at uses for PDAs, but it is a great way of defining an ideal household PDA. It doesn't have to do anything in particular, although a simple wall mounted memo pad would fit this category perfectly, just capture and present data on its surface, and talk to the rest of the household system. Any such device has to have a very low power consumption and be ready for use instantly. If you took a PalmPC (or AutoPC) device and wired it into a wall, it would match this description. For many uses I'd actually prefer a voice driven user interface like the AutoPC is supposed to have. In fact, with the audio control capabilities of the AutoPC, it should be as much at home as a household device as it may be in the car.

Words and design by:
Paul Lynch
Last updated: April 21, 1998